Nothing sounds worse than an instrument that is out of tune! When a guitar is out of tune, it will sound bad no matter how good a player you are. It can also make beginners think that they are playing badly when in fact it’s the guitars fault!

As soon as you pick up a guitar you should always check if it is in tune. The longer you play guitar the easier it will be to tell if it is out of tune. This technique requires patience and practice just like any other. The more you practice, the easier it will get. There are many ways to tune a guitar but these are the most important and useful methods for beginners.

Clip-on Electric Tuners

The easiest and most common method is to use a clip on electronic tuner. These work by sensing the vibration of your guitar as you play a note. Pick the open string and let the note ring. Follow the electronic tuner screen and use the guitar string’s tuning peg until the note is in tune. from low pitch to high pitch, the string pitches are E A D G B E. Some acoustic guitars have tuners built-in and they work the same way as the clip on types.

Smartphone Tuners

Instead of sensing vibration as the clip on tuners do, the smartphone tuner apps “listen” to the note you play on the guitar and issue tuning instructions to the player. You have to place the phone close to the guitar for best results. Although not as accurate as the clip on tuners, these apps are very convenient and are mostly free to download.

Tuning to a Note

This method involves listening to a reference note being played by a keyboard or any recording of accurate pitches and tuning your guitar to match that pitch by ear. For example, If a piano played an A, you could listen to it and tune your A string until the sound matches perfectly. Although difficult and slow to start with, this is a very important skill to develop as a guitar player and I highly recommend practicing this as much as possible.   

Tuning to a Not